If you missed community interaction, this is for you

By Artemis Pattichi A successful seed planting day is now behind us and many more community events are ahead. As you may have already read in last month’s column, we decided to include the wider community in our effort to grow seeds into the next round of winter vegies for the community garden at Boyd. Turning this into an inclusive community event as much as possible, we invited all Southbankers to come learn how to grow plants from seeds in a small space like an apartment, while caring for newly planted seeds at home until they become resilient seedlings and are ready for their permanent home in Southbank’s community garden. The February 20 seed planting event was a bigger success than we anticipated! Southbank showed up, with close to 45 Southbankers of all ages, life stages and backgrounds coming together on the day. We loved seeing the sense of community forming, participants leaving with their repurposed egg cartons now housing new plants, wide smiles on faces and excitement in people’s eyes, and many hanging around to meet and chat with neighbours. We even managed to keep it a 100 per cent zero waste event. Of course, this event wouldn’t have been possible if it wasn’t for our amazing members and volunteers, who worked collaboratively and seamlessly behind the scenes and on the day to make it a successful community day. A big thank you goes out to all of them! Go to our Facebook page to see photos of the day and a lovely care instructions video our new educational events champion, Sarah Horner, created. Southbank Seedling Planting Day Saturday, March 20 at 10.30am will be time to replant the winter vegie seedlings into the community garden. We want to include the Southbank community as much as possible and make this a learning opportunity again, so we invite all Southbankers to come join us on the day. Whether you came to the seed planting event or not, you can come help plant the next round of communal vegies and herbs, while learning home growing tips. Please register at: southbankplantingday.eventbrite.com. The garden in March With our group’s new champions leadership team, more people sharing the workload and the wonderful new skills they bring, we’re now working on long-term planning for the community garden and applying companion planting principles a bit better. We’ll soon be redoing a lot of the existing garden beds to make sure vegies growing together are good for each other, the soil’s health and also work well as natural pesticides. As per the amazing plans Maria and Faye, Southbank Sustainability Group’s (SSG’s) gardening champions have put together. You will see a lot of garden beds going empty for a while before they are replanted, so don’t be alarmed. We encourage you to harvest as much as possible in the next few days before plants are either cleared or replanted in a different part of the garden, always following the harvesting instructions you’ll see in the garden and noticeboard. DIY green cleaning workshop We’re working on delivering a “DIY Green Cleaning” workshop next, on Saturday, April 17 at 10.30am. Using common household ingredients, participants will learn how to make their own eco-safe, zero waste home cleaning supplies that are better for our health, waterways, the environment and wallets. We’re organising details, but the facilitator and date are confirmed, and seats will be limited. We’ll include more details in our next column. In the meantime, watch our Facebook page or email us for the registration link as soon as it’s live so you don’t miss out. Next meetups SSG’s next meetups will be March 20 (planting day event), then Saturday, April 10 due to the Easter break. We might add a gardening working bee day in between, so watch our Facebook page or email us if you’d like to participate. As always, everyone is welcome regardless of gardening skills or experience. About the group: A solutions-focused group of Southbankers working to bring positive change in sustainability practices and education to our neighbourhood, while building a wonderful community of like-minded people. Free to join. 2019 Environment Melbourne Award & KVB 2020 Sustainable Cities Environment Award winner • Reach us at: [email protected] or facebook.com/SouthbankSustainabilityGroup